"My sweet wife, my life's companion,
Canst thou not recall the time
When we sate beneath the lilacs,
Listening to that simple rhyme?
"I was then just five-and-twenty,
Young in years, but old in sooth;
Hopeless love had dimmed my manhood,
Care had saddened all my youth.
"But that touching, simple ballad,
Which thy uncle writ and read,
Like the words of God, creative,
Gave a life unto the dead.
"And thenceforth have been so blissful
All our days, so calm, so bright,
That it seems like joy to linger
O'er my young life's early blight.
"Easy was my father's temper,
And his being passed along
Like a streamlet 'neath the willows,
Lapsing to the linnet's song.
"With the scholar's tastes and feelings,
He had all he asked of life
In his books and in his garden,
In his child, and gentle wife.
"He was for the world unfitted;
For its idols knew no love;
And, without the serpent's wisdom
Was as guileless as the dove.
"Such men are the schemer's victims.
Trusting to a faithless guide,
He was lured on to his ruin,
And a hopeless bankrupt died.
"Short had been my father's sorrow;
He had not the strength to face
What was worse than altered fortune,
Or than faithless friends—disgrace.
"He had not the strength to combat
Through the adverse ranks of life;
In his prime he died, heart-broken,
Leaving unto us the strife.